Toby Jones to Play Lou Pearlman in TV Series

Toby Jones has been tapped to play the late Lou Pearlman in the TV series that will chronicle the life of the fraudulent boy band producer, Variety has learned.

The project is currently in development as a limited series. It hasn’t landed at a network yet, but insiders say four different buyers are extremely interested and a home for the series is expected to be announced soon. The project is being shopped to both cable networks and streaming platforms. The search for a writer and director are currently underway.

Lou Pearlman launched mega boy bands such as *NSYNC and Backstreet Boys, and infamously ran a $300 million Ponzi scheme, which sent him to prison for a 25-year sentence. Pearlman died in jail this past August. The potential series is based on The New Yorker article titled, “We Live in the Pop-Culture World That Lou Pearlman Created,” and will tell the story of Pearlman’s life with details of his rise from blimp business owner to the music mogul and then his fall to fraud.